Having another poor shooting night with 22 percent against a good team will lead to a lopsided score, which is what happened to the Mexico Lady Bulldogs Wednesday night when they played Hermann in the Montgomery County R-2 tournament. Hermann won 51-33.

"The girls did a good job coming out after half and continuing to fight. I was pleased they weren't ready to quit," stated MHS coach Ed Costley. Hermann had a big second quarter to open the game up. Mexico did not do a good job taking care of the ball with 21 turnovers, allowing Hermann too many transition points. "We struggled on rebounds giving them too many second chance opportunities and losing Danielle Baumgartner in the first few minutes with an injury took away our best rebounder," said Costley. "Finding our rhythm on offense and finding a balance of scoring opportunities is what I have to focus on for our team," added the coach.

Brooke Costley led the Lady Bulldogs with 9 points, (1 assist and a total of 5 rebounds (1 for offense and 4 for defense). Alison Mudd scored 6 points, followed by Anne Baker with 5. Karen Baker and Kelli Ingrum, each scored 4 points, while Danielle Baumgartner scored 3 and Kaitlin Ingrum, 2P. Costley, Mudd and Anne Baker each had one 3-point basket. Ashlie Woodruff lead in assists with 2.

The Lady Bulldogs will play Friday at 7:30 p.m. against Fulton for third place in the tournament.

SCORE BY QUARTERS:

MEXICO: 7, 4, 12, 10

HERMANN: 11, 19, 9, 12

FRESHMEN TOURNAMENT: The Mexico Freshmen basketball tournament continued Wednesday night in Gooch gym with the following results:

MMS EIGHTH GRADE GIRLS: Mexico Middle School continued in pool play in the Centralia Tournament Tuesday night when they played West Junior from Columbia and came home with their first win, a 36-19 victory.

"We were hot early on and shot extremely well (including a trio of 3-pointers) that gave us a lot of confidence and set the tone. We also got contributions from everyone with eight different players scoring.

Mexico took an early lead in the first quarter 13-2, and at halftime the score was 29-4.

MMS will play for third place in the tournament at 7:30 tonight.

ST. BRENDAN: St. Brendan (1-7) was defeated in a close game to St. Pius X 34 - 30 at the St. Pius X Tournament.

"We had many open looks in the paint tonight that would not fall for us. Our defense was working well and the team moved the ball and penetrated to get the shots," said St. Brendan Coach Chris Abbott. The team continues to grow and support one another on the court well. Jeffrey Burgess lead St. Brendan in scoring with 12 points followed by Andrew Whitworth with 11 points and Cooper Manns with 7.

Page 2 of 2 - St. Brendan plays St. Joseph (Salisbury) in the third place game, tonight at 7:30.

COMMUNITY R-6: The Lady Trojans basketball team started their season in winning fashion Tuesday when they won against Mark Lady Twain Tigers 34-27.

"As expected Paige Curtis and Paige Harris provided great leadership and lead us in scoring in our first game of the season," stated R-6 Coach Bob Curtis. The defense was solid in the first half allowing only 7 points to the Tigers at the break. Emmalee McCoskey did a nice job off the bench in the third quarter when the Lady Trojans got into foul trouble, scoring 6 points during that time frame. Curtis lead the way for the Lady Trojans with 9 points and 8 rebounds, Harris scored 7P, McCoskey added 6P while Amelia Knipfel score 5 with one 3-point basket, she also had 2 steals. Leah Mays had 3 steals. Julie Hale lead is assists with 3.

SCORE BY QUARTERS:

COMMUNITY R-6: 11, 6, 9, 8

MARK TWAIN: 2, 5, 8 12

The next game for the Lady Trojans will be tonight with junior varsity and varsity at Van-Far.

NORTH CALLAWAY: After trailing by only 6 points at the half, the North Callaway Thunderbirds lost 45-22 to Moberly Wednesday in the Mexico Freshmen Tournament. The Thunderbirds score only 4 points in the third and fourth quarters. Leading the way for North Callaway were Manzell Payne with 7 points and Quinten Nichols with 6. North Callaway (0-2) plays Hannibal at 9 a.m. Saturday in the tournament.